Sorry for the large gap between posts! Things have been busy between judging team and finals. Judging team took 8th at the NRHA futurity in Oklahoma, placing over 4 four year college teams and many other two year colleges. Aspen has had about 11 rides on her and can walk, trot, and canter with little fuss. She has also mastered a whoa and back. Rain is starting to understand neck reining and has finally got a solid jog. Both the horses and I are ready for a break! Getting ready to go home for Christmas, horses are enjoying some nice turn out at Mcfadden Ranch.
The judging competition in Rapid city went very well for my team. Lots of really nice horses, and some average ones too, I didn't think Aspen matched up the the AQHA show horse as far as the way she is built but she would have fit in very well at this show! Judged many classes and became pretty confident before the actual judging competition, we judged a western pleasure class, reining class, and trail class for our performance classes. Then three halter classes, but there were no true halter bred horses... We were given twenty minutes to write and memorize two sets of reasons, one on a halter class one on the western pleasure classes, this was my fourth time ever trying this. Reasons were a little rough for everyone, but we got thru them. I ended up with 1st place individual judging performance, and 4th overall, as a team we got 1st place collegiate team and 2nd place team for reasons overall. Not a bad trip!
Aspen had a little bit of a temper tantrum in class on Wednesday, she didn't like the big heavy rope being tossed over her back at all. But today she did it perfectly, didn't change her speed even slightly. She gets to start wearing the saddle on Monday. Rain was a little moody this week as well, she didn't like that I had to use spurs on her to get her using her shoulders correctly. We are going on a trail ride tomorrow, so hopefully that will giver her a chance to get a break form all the arena work and come back refreshed and ready to not be moody about arena work. Aspen: Aspen has come a long way in the past week of colt starting class. She was the only one colt in class yesterday that was far enough along in her lunging and sacking out to move on to introducing to weight on her back. She stood well for me jumping and leaning across her back, and moved on to learning to stand by the mounting block. She was fine with my weight leaning full on across her back. We will be starting with a saddle in about a week and a half!
Rain: Rain is doing great with all the work we are doing in class. Being a horse that carries a lot of muscle she has been a little heavy with her shoulders. But the class work is helping with that, and helping her learn to correctly set her head. She seems to be enjoying the work! Other: The equine judging team is going to a practice run at the AQHA regional show this weekend. This will give us some much needed practice on live judging before going to some of the bigger shows. It will also introduce us to some of the bigger trainers, riders, breeders, judges, and horses of the area. The first two weeks of my second year of college are over. Rain and Aspen are settled into their life for the year, and are finally starting to be a little cleaner in their stalls. Rain has gained some muscle and is getting into good shape with being ridden almost everyday, she isn't getting sore any more either. I have been working on figuring out what she knows and how she likes to communicate. So far she is a lot like her brother, slow and steady, with a good mind and great movement. Aspen has been working on the longline and in the roundpen, as well as sacking out and learning personal space.
Start blogging by creating a new post. You can edit or delete me by clicking under the comments. You can also customize your sidebar by dragging in elements from the top bar.
|
AuthorI am a student studying to become a horse trainer at Northwest College. Archives
December 2011
Categories |